Legal papers piling up at Supreme Court in UT admissions case

Lawyers challenging the University of Texas’ consideration of race and ethnicity in admissions filed a 57-page brief with the U.S. Supreme Court the other day. Their main argument, in a nutshell, goes something like this:

UT justifies its program in part by claiming that it enables admissions officers to enroll minority students from integrated high schools and more affluent socioeconomic backgrounds than the minority students who are the first in their families to attend college and who tend to hail from lower-income, more segregated schools. This effort to achieve “diversity within diversity” is flawed, procedurally and on the merits, and UT’s consideration of race and ethnicity should therefore should be struck down.

It remains to be seen whether that line of argument from the lawyers for plaintiff Abigail Fisher will resonate with the court. A panel of appellate judges rejected such arguments and upheld UT’s program by a 2-1 vote in 2014.

UT’s brief is due Oct. 26. Oral arguments have yet to be scheduled.

This is the second go-round at the Supreme Court for Fisher v. UT. In Round 1, the high court punted, telling the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in 2013 to apply “strict scrutiny” to the university’s consideration of applicants’ race and ethnicity. As they did in 2011, the appellate ruled that the university’s program passes legal muster.

UT had urged the Supreme Court not to take the case a second time, which would have preserved the 5th Circuit’s ruling and ended seven years of litigation.

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